Thank all you ladies for sharing your storiess it is certainly a blessing to have others who have gone through the fire and are leaving their foot prints for me to follow and learn from thank you again for your guts to be part of trials and so on, this has allowed ladies like me to benefit from your guts to survive and thrive. renee

This is exactly what I needed to read (after Scriptures of course). I was diagnosed today with multicentric IDC in the left breast, 1/1 lymph node, ER-/PR-/HER2+++. So....a rare cancer that is aggressive huh? Nothing a child of God cannot handle.

I'm 41, 3 kids, ages 15, 13, and 6. Going for MRI, pet scan, bone scan, and chest xray next week, followed by mastectomy at least on the one side. Guess I should insist on bilateral mastectomy, huh?

That is what I did when I learned I had HER2+ breast cancer and how aggressive it is. My surgeon was telling me there was no disease detected in my right breast and it could be saved. I just told her, "The decision has been made!" I am vert glad I made that decision. Good luck. Some good advice I received from another doctor was to make the best decision with the information I had and never look back. Second guessing can be a real downer and to survive this disease, one has to stay focused on the goal and stay positive.

hi my name is karen i was reading your letter i live in australia and had the same her2 stage 3 i was told on my birthday in 2007 and i had not heard of anyone else with this type of breast cancer til i came on this site i an glad of herceptin 2 thank u for your post it has inspired me

I have just signed up for the Phase III ALTTO Clinical trial. I'm scheduled to begin chemo on Aug. 19th. I have to wait until my visit with the chemo nurse for lab work on Aug.16th to find out what arm I will be placed in. I'm prayerful that I will receive Tykerb in addition to the Taxotere, Carboplatin, & Herceptin.

To update this... I am now 7 years out!! I hope all stage 3 Her 2 pos women can see this post and have hope for themselves..I remember when I was dx i wanted to read stories of women that had it "worse then me" and still be around. Herceptin is a miracle drug!!

I see that you had 3 months of Tykerb off label in your signature. How do people get on Tykerb at stage I/II for preventive care if I wanted my wife to do that?

__________________
Caregiver to my wife
32 year old diagnosed with BC
Lump found on left breast with BSE in March 2010
Radiologist told her it was fine,come back in ten years
Gyn told her to see breast specialist
Breast Specialist says it is cancer
Diagnosed July 2010
Lumpectomy in left breast only August 2010

Dear Michelle,
May God bless you and your family, I have been fighting bc for 7 years and have been stage 4 for almost 4 years! Congrats and I hope herceptin works miracles for you, but for me it only worked 6 months...thank goodness for all the new drug therapies!
Lisa Baum

You have given me hope,micheleu I had her2+ er- pr-stageIIa had chemo,37 rnds of radiation & a yr of Herceptin,sometimes I start losing hope & I come back to Her2 support & I start feeling hopeful ! you are a true inspiration,may god rihly bless you. Joanna J

Just a little more encouragement ladies. I'm 4 yrs 6 mos out from Stage 2, HER2+, 2 cm, clear nodes. Surgeon strongly suggested lumpectomy with radiation leaving golfball size hole in breast. I elected double masectomy. Biopsy showed another HER2+ tumor the lumpectomy would have left which did not show up on MRI. 5 months of chemo and 12 months of herceptin. In dr's waiting room on 2/09 I read an artical about herceptin and how it was FDA approved for earlier staged cancer in 11/08. Many Drs cried in the auditorum when this was anounced, b/c we had a very poor prognois without it. My advice.... when fear consumes you, you MUST count your blessings over and over. You will find you feel much better. Stay optimistic and stamp out the fear!!! Bless you all!!

I'm not a member of the 5 year club yet but I'm working and praying I get there. I celebrated my 4 year diagnosis anniversary on Tuesday. I was 51 years old, clean mamogram in May and in August I accidentally found a lump. I am sorry to say that I did not do self-exams because I had lumpy breasts most of the time. I knew this one was different. Sure enough stage 3, (6.2 cm tumor)1/18 nodes positive, HER2+++. My family doctor told me to "go home and enjoy my life" which was probably a good thing. I got mad and sought state of the art treatment instead from MD Anderson instead of staying local. With the blesssings of God and the knowledge of MD Anderson, I'm still here and disease free. I had 15 months of chemo, radiation, and 1 year of herceptin. I am so blessed. I worked every day except chemo days. I did take off for radiation because of travel time. I'm 55 now and going stronger than ever. There is hope and life after a cancer diagnosis. I agree, you are not a statistic or a number. You are you. I put my numbers through one of those predictive calculators and they were not great, but I only did it once. Don't dwell on the negative and remember with God all things are possible. Also, stay away from negative people. They are just as toxic as cancer.

Wow all these comments and stories are really encouraging to me as a new member of this site. I was diagnoised with breast cancer in December 2009 then with metastatic cancer a couple of months ago. I have been through the ringer like most of us here. Recently on a scan it was discovered I have met in 3 bone areas and I'm due for a new scan this month to re-check these. Since my scan I have had my ovaries removed hoping to get rid of any extra estrogen my body is producing. I've been having a hard time knowing that since April of 2011 I had it travel to 3 different places it was so fast. It's now in my rib, back & sternum. I wanted to do a trial but at this time they say I have no measurable disease and I'm not eligible for any trials. For me the herceptin, tamoxifin and the bone strengthner alone are not cutting it. I want to switch to femora and try that now that my ovaries are gone. Lets all hope and pray they come out with a cure for this cancer... Peace out

thank you Michele. I needed that post too. I did not have tykerb. why did they give you tykerb? Just wondering why I didnt get it. My doctor said I got the standard treatment and it worked so nothing else till it returns,. He told me 50/50 it will come back but i am standing on the good 50 side! i lost 31 nodes and 18 were positive. there was also 2 nodes with cancer in my neck they could not operate on, but chemo destroyed the cancer and radiation destroyed the nodes. I have stage 2 Lymphedema in my left arm. I wear a compression sleeve every day and do manual lymph drainage daily. sometimes it is a pain, but i am thankful i am alive so my lymphedema is nothing! my arm swells sometime but the sleeve contains it so it will not turn into elephantitus. I find it scary at times, worrying about the cancer coming back, but then i dismiss that negative thought... see it as a waste of energy. concentrate on living but that word cancer still haunts me. thank you for your post I want to be just like you and al the others on here that beat the odds. thanks!! Bonita